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These Friday posts have become a nice way of looking out at the world beyond the 16th Street J. If I could summon an image for today’s post I would draw a circle around us at 16th and Q, then a slightly larger circle that would probably go north to R Street, then a larger circle that would take in the entire District, another that encompasses the Beltway, then moves out to include Baltimore, and then after that, (why not) the whole world.

First, our neighbors National Museum of American Jewish Military History at 18th and R Streets were recognized in the Washington Post today for a new exhibit that documents the first protest against Hitler’s regime. Organized by Jewish American war veterans, the march took place March 23, 1933, when Hitler had only been in power for three days, and led 6,000 people to City Hall in New York while a crowd of spectators 10 deep watched.

Our friends at the AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center will be presenting the New African Films Festival today through March 17. Tickets are still available for tonight’s opener, Ezra which will be introduced by Danny Glover.

This Sunday, the final episode of The Wire airs on HBO. We’re sorry to see the end of this quality series and reliable employer of many a DC actor trekking up I-95 to Baltimore for day-work. So is a blogger at JSpot, but she worries (with some reason) that the series may conclude by too simply pointing to a Jewish bogeyman.

Over the pond, in the U.K. a group of 14-year old Yeshiva girls refused to answer a question about Shakespeare on a national exam to protest the antisemitism in The Merchant of Venice. The true genius of this manuever was that the question on the exam was actually about The Tempest (which often gets accused of racism for its portrayal of Caliban). Meanwhile, around the internet, bloggers slapped their foreheads in dismay although the school’s principal, said he was “proud.”

Of course, our sympathies are with the family and friends of the 8 students murdered in the terrorist attack on the Mercaz Harav Yeshiva in Jerusalem.